Otto's 1st birthday & late garden

Otto yesterday

Otto is one today. Bold, black and beautiful, very well behaved indoors. Outdoors - well, he's still overenthusiastic and becoming more adventurous so much room for improvement.

Before the storm

Nerines in late September. Above, the blue plumbago looks good in the autumn

July garden,My Last Duchess, & film: The Social Network

The garden here in July. Some of the above roses have now been washed out by the rain and the wild sweet peas are not as bright, but the newish flower bed above is still quite jolly with some pink dascia now blooming in the middle.

My Last Duchess by Daisy Goodwin – an excellent holiday read.  Maybe we've seen some of the plot lines before but it’s huge fun. I loved the characters and the Downton Abbey setting (most action takes place Upstairs rather than down). As a spoilt American heiress, brought up by a strict, social climbing mother, haughty Cora does not find life easy when she comes to England and marries a Duke.  Dovegreyreader enjoyed it too.

Film – the Social Network. The story of the founding of Facebook by young geeks at Harvard. To work out what’s going on you probably need a young person with you to stop the DVD periodically and explain, or you could read up the plot on Wiki first, I dare say.  You may possibly also need subtitles, as the actors speak extra fast gobbledegook.  Good acting, an interesting film, not crucial viewing though.

Lilac and The Far Pavilions

Top photo shows the new dog fence, keeping Otto in the back garden, which seems to have fitted in quite well. Wisteria this year isn't as good as usual, maybe it's the drought.
I'm always glad when the beech hedge above comes into leaf.

DVD The Far Pavilions, 1984, with Ben Cross, Christopher Lee, Rosanno Brazzi. Good stuff about the British Raj fighting wars in mid-Victorian times on the North-West Frontier of what is now Pakistan - ring any bells?  It's a lavish production shot in India and Wales (?), including numerous extras, even elephants, but seemed slow-moving compared to modern dramas.  I wasn't entirely convinced by the main actors, particularly the one who played Anjuli, so I think it would probably be better to read the original 1978 novel by MM Kaye, if you haven't already.
It's a good dramatic plot about a young white man brought up as an Indian who is torn between two or three worlds: the stuffy Raj, his regiment and his Indian friends (Omar Sharif plays his adopted father).  Now an Army officer, the hero is in love with a half-Indian princess, who with her sister, is about to be married to a lecherous old Rana. So their romance is doomed on all counts.

Puppy and Spring again

Belated Happy Easter from tropical England. We had a houseful of visitors including Blackberry the cat, who made it clear with tooth and claw that he did not wish to meet a dog, ever.  So Blackberry stayed in the front part of the house and garden, while Otto kept to the back, his usual domain. It's possible that Otto is thinking of a career as a builder's mate as he's keen on bricks, logs and flints which he piles up in a heap on the lawn.  Better than chewing the door frames, I suppose. He was also keen on retrieving pingpong balls unfortunately. Meanwhile, lying in the sun on the front porch, Blackberry kept aloof from all the sports, human and animal.

Smiled a lot while reading The Uncommon Reader by Alan Bennett, a short novel about what happened when the Queen suddenly became a keen reader. Here's an excellent Guardian review. A suitable book for the Kindle as it is subtly amusing rather than complicated. Do read it.

Beech trees, bench and Baltimore

The bench that was painted Kermit green hasn't faded that much but I've got used to it.

Recent Reading
Much enjoyed Anne Tyler's new novel, Noah's Compass.  'Wise, gently humorous, it's about a schoolteacher, forced to retire at sixty-one, coming to terms with the final phase of his life. Liam Pennywell, who set out to be a philosopher and ended up teaching, never much liked the job so early retirement doesn't bother him. What does bother him is that he has lost the memory of what happened the first night after he moved into his spare, efficient condominium on the outskirts of Baltimore. All he knows when he wakes up a day later in the hospital is that his head is sore and bandaged.' 
Apart from the hospital scene, this is another novel about the gentle minutae of ordinary life.  Two wives gave up on Liam and he doesn't seem to connect strongly with his daughters. He's is a quiet man who doesn't expect or give much, but he's interesting all the same.  Amazing how Anne Tyler writes so brilliantly about unexceptional events.  She's like Jane Austen in that sense though obviously current day Baltimore is different from C18 Bath. I'm sure people will read Anne Tyler in centuries to come.
I don't know if this new novel would appeal to the young but it appealed to me.  Here's a Guardian review.

Fascinating Aida and films

I don't know if you've ever been to a show by Fascinating Aida but they're very witty in a sophisticated but sometimes rude and raunchy feminist way. Here's an amusing video about flights to Ireland for 50p which, surprise, surprise, turn out to cost a bit more. Now I wonder which airline they can be thinking of?  The star Dilly Keane is the sister of one of my friends, so I feel vicariously proud of her talents. Does contain strong language, sorry.

Films
Watched The Remains of the Day and enjoyed it just as much the second (third?)time.  In a lost world pre-WW2, Stevens (Anthony Hopkins) is a perfect English butler, efficient, self-effacing, almost religious in the practice of a profession where everybody knows their place in the hierarchy. He is oblivious of the real life that goes on around him - oblivious, for instance, of his naive aristocratic employer's political leanings.  Stevens is also unaware of his own feelings for the housekeeper Mrs Kenton (Emma Thompson)  The novel by Kashuo Ishiguro won the Booker prize. 

Up in the Air did star George Clooney which was a plus, but otherwise it seemed a fairly forgettable film.  George travels around the US firing people 'for businesses who don't have the balls to do it themselves.'  Finally it dawns on him that this isn't a wonderful career.

Garden washed out but in the occasional dry period the new flower bed looks quite jolly.

Recent reading

The Season of Second Chances by Diane Meier. Professor Joy Harkness has had a successful career so far, but her private life is so private she has very few friends in New York or elsewhere. She’s offered a brilliant job at Amherst College in the depths of the Massachusetts countryside where she rashly buys a derelict Victorian house. I liked 48-year-old Joy. Her slow transformation from dry long-divorced childless WASP professor to warm, much more outgoing woman is told in the first person with self-deprecating humour but, for me, the novel leans slightly too much towards solemn life-craft at the end. And sometimes maybe there’s a little too much detail about paint colours. Was a bit worried about the (robin's egg) blue ceilings.

So Joy is a feminist who has failed, so far, to connect to her female side and she learns it’s OK to care about clothes and wallpaper(!), and, more important, be part of a community. Against her instincts, she finds she can cope with looking after other people’s children and even a dog. As far as potential lovers are concerned, she meets some randy profs and one unusual treasure of a handyman who teaches her to value craft and style - style is a feature in the book. In turn she tries to improve his life and wrest him away from his mother. I was kind of disappointed that the novel ended so suddenly. I enjoyed it a lot though, loved the characters and setting, and looked forward to its company every evening. Here are some links. Diane Meier, Women Over 40 Rock (?)  Moral of the story is: it is never too late to bloom, but, you know, maybe I appreciated the book more because I didn't think about its earnest themes and messages while I was reading.

Cheated by posting last year's garden pics

A Change in Altitude by Anita Shreve.  I enjoyed the descriptions of life in Kenya in the 1970s, especially the mountain climbing, but, trouble is, I didn't much care for the rather tiresome main character nor her doctor husband.  There's a misleading quote on the back of the book which implies it has a thriller element, but it doesn't.  It's about a marriage with problems and in the end I didn't mind what happened to the protagonists.

The Chaemleon's Shadow by Minette Walters.  Picked this up second-hand.  An interesting psychological thriller.  A good read - and topical, I'm sad to say - but parts of the denouement were distressingly sordid.  Minette is bound to be gritty, of course. Here's a blurb 'Having received severe head injuries in Iraq, Lt Charles Acland cuts all ties with his former life and moves to London.  Disfigured and alone, he sinks into a private world of anger, guilt and paranoia.  But then he attracts the attention of local police investigating three murders.'

Wisteria, lilac, peony and drama

Blind panic at 7.15 pm last Wednesday.  Just before I was due to go out with girlfriends, I realised my wallet wasn't in my handbag. Quickly ransacked house, could not check my car as son had taken it to the station (of course if it was there, the car would be broken into, I reckoned gloomily) Returned at midnight, searched car, no wallet, so I tossed and turned all night. I'd last used it at the village shop at midday that day but knew they would have rung me if they had found it on the counter. Where the XXXX was it and how many cards would I have to cancel? Wd have to borrow cash etc etc. Rang shop at five past eight next morning. Owner said that a delivery man had just that second handed it in. So I must have stupidly dropped it and it had sat unnoticed outside the village shop on the ground for 20 hours. There's only space for about four cars in this next-to-street parking and people usually amble up and down the village all day. Shop owner said she always knew it was quiet on Wednesday afternoons here.
Restores one's faith in human nature.

Garden & Mr Chips

The moving 2002 version of Goodbye Mr Chips was almost ruined by the ridiculous amount of ads on ITV3 last night. Martin Clunes was excellent in the title role and I liked the actress who played his wife. Couldn't think why she was so familiar then it dawned on me she was Miss Ruby from the drapers in Candleford (as in Lark Rise To...)

Have just re-read the original Mr Chips novel which is so short it is almost a short story.  In this sympathetic film the producers have added much, including a storyline about bullying which must still seem realistic to those chaps who went to public schools as recently as the 1960s.  Mr Chips himself was born in the mid 1800s and dies as a very old man in the 1930s.  Of course I wept, despite the ads and despite the fact I've seen various film versions before.

Many of the outdoor locations were shot at the school my sons attended, so that made it all the more interesting for us.

Garden blooming at last though fear have lost a few plants in the cold.

Spring & Cooking

Spring at last.  Isn't it wonderful?

Cooking at the mo as family etc here this weekend.  Decided to try Jamie Oliver's Chicken Tagine.  Sainos supermarket lady saw me examining the displayed cookbook and explained they had Moroccan preserved lemons in stock, phew, and the prog had only aired the night before.  Bought said lemons at vast expense but to me they tasted not v.exciting. Cd've saved myself £4 by adding lemon juice. We'll see what the final deeply authentic dish tastes like.  I had to watch the recipe on Channel Four 'catch-up' in order to check the ingredients, but basically you rub and marinate the chicken with cumin, coriander seed and ginger, and some olive oil for 2 hrs, fry chicken, fry onions and garlic too, add chicken stock, pinch of saffron, plus stoned olives and 3 small preserved salted lemons.  I also added aubergines because I had some around, and stoned dates because another recipe suggested them.  Then you simmer the whole lot slowly for 1 1/2 hrs. I didn't buy Jamie's latest book, Jamie Does Spain, Italy, Morocco, Sweden Greece & France, because I have 50 cookbooks, but maybe I will in the end, because he is such a good original simple cook.
It was fascinating watching him go around the Marrakech market collecting tiny slices of various ingredients in his stew pot/tagine and then taking the pot to the baker's oven (or bathhouse-stove embers?) to be cooked. I approve of main courses that can be prepared in advance like tagines, which sound so much more glamorous than stew.
A week later:  Yes the recipe was a great success. I do think the preserved lemons added an unusual taste which made it different but still delicious.  Went down very well with the family.  Next day we had a drinks party in the sun. For this event I'd ordered some of the food from Waitrose Entertaining and made the rest.  Fortunately the young helped prepare and serve, and then they sat down and ate an enormous lunch. Took me a week to recover from all this catering and excitement.

Film, books, TV and, yes, the garden

Enjoyed the film, An Education.  A clever young schoolgirl learns more than she bargains for from an attractive older man who turns out to be even dodgier than she thinks.  Set in the early sixties, with good atmosphere. Kind of a comedy, but more of a cautionary tale. 'Jenny' is so anxious to escape from suburbia that she goes along with his wiles. Excellent, convincing acting all round.  The film was based on a memoir by the journalist Lynn Barber, whose unsophisticated parents must have been charmed and even more conned by the chap than their daughter. By the way, it's clear she went to a school (Lady Eleanor Holles, Hampton) that expected more from girls than most did in those days. Here's an interview with LBarber, but don't read it before you have seen the film.

Recent Reading

The Colour by Rose Tremain.  'In the mid 1800s Joseph and Harriet Blackstone emigrate from Norfolk to New Zealand in search of new beginnings and prosperity. But the harsh land near Christchurch where they settle threatens to destroy them almost before they begin. When the unpleasant Joseph finds gold in the creek he is seized by a secretive obsession with the supposed riches awaiting him deep in the earth. Abandoning his farm and family, he sets off alone for the new gold-fields over the Southern Alps, a moral wilderness where many others are violently rushing to their destinies.' Eventually Harriet attempts to find him and we learn why Joseph was so keen to leave England in the first place.

I thought this was a terrific novel, do read it. Must now look out for more books by Rose Tremain.

Astonishing Splashes of Colour by Clare Morrall is a first novel told from the unreliable viewpoint of an unhinged young woman. Kitty has lost a baby and hasn’t recovered her mental balance. She’s sympathetic and I found it an interesting read.

I’m probably the only person in the world who isn’t crazy about Isabel Dalhousie and The Sunday Philosophy Club. Alexander McCall Smith’s writing is charming as ever, but I never quite believe in Isabel as she sounds so old and fusty for her age. And I was annoyed by her actions in visiting a bereaved mother in such a tactless and intrusive manner.

I love Edinburgh, but wasn't convinced by the storyline of Doors Open by Ian Rankin, so put it down.  Perhaps it just isn't my thing. Don't suppose he will mind.

Enjoyed a nostalgic wallow with Frank Sinatra last week on TV.  And we all roared with laughter at Outnumbered last night. Those children are so scarily real and hilarious.

Delighted that Spring has sprung at last. I keep pottering round the garden seeing what has survived the winter, still have fingers crossed about one or two shrubs and not sure about the 'hardy' dahlia yet.

Booktrade News, with shrub

Above - the mahonia must have been planted by the first owner of this house in the sixties and it's enormous. I love the red leaves, and the scent of the new flowers that are about to appear.

The Romantic Novel of the Year 2010 longlist has been announced. Some interesting books there.

Richard and Judy are again planning their own bookclub, a potential rival to More 4's panel and their former producer, apparently. I suspect the public will buy the R&J books rather than those chosen by a panel of celebs. Interesting.

Govt U-turn. Authors visiting to talk at schools won't have to be vetted for criminal activity after all. Victory for Philip Pullman et al.

Moment of Enthusiasm

It might not be exciting news but in a rare and rash moment of gardening enthusiasm (have to make the most of it) I have dug out the yellow loosestrife and replanted as above. The gigantic clump of loosestrife must have been there at least thirty years, so it was a bold move on my part. Have planted an allegedly hardy dahlia, crocosmia, oregano or something else purple, red lobelia, agapanthus and abelia. We'll see what happens. I hope it won't all die in a cold winter but I dare say the tough old loosetrife will reappear anyway.

Reading: Re-reading Angela's Ashes at the moment. Not quite as harrowing the second time around as you know what tragedies are going to happen.

Surfing: encouraged to see that Tropical Connections and Paris Imperfect have been bought by libraries in the USA and Australia.

Kitten, now cat, staying again and very keen on catching minute baby voles and bringing them indoors to play with. I am less keen.

July jungle and recent reading

Evening sun on garden jungle above. Please ignore weeds. I do at the moment.

Just finished The Behaviour of Moths by Poppy Adams, shortlisted for the Costa last year. Excellent, well written story narrated by an unreliable, mentally strange old woman who was an expert on moths. I didn't believe anyone could make this dry subject interesting, but the author does so in her tale of sibling rivalry, all set in Dorset in a virtually empty, isolated Victorian gothic mansion. As the narrator looks back on her dysfunctional family life - her sister has suddenly reappeared after 45 years away - there's no standard romance, very little sex, and, despite the flashbacks, no rock'n'roll, but do read it and tell me what you think. I'm not sure the novel even needed the melodramatic ending.

A good choice for a book club, though the squeamish may not care for some aspects of moth harvesting. In my childhood, it was fashionable to collect butterflies which did, I admit, involve asphixiating them with chloroform in a jam jar, but we didn't think anything of it at the time.

I'm sure I'll read this intelligent novel again one day, but I'll probably skip a little of the moth stuff next time, because I have a feeling I may have missed other nuances.

Belgian dancing

Great YouTube clip of Doh-Ray-Me dancing at a Belgian station. Guaranteed to warm the cockles of the most jaded heart. (Why cockles, I wonder? Perhaps the heart looks like a cockle. I sometimes watch operations on telly but usually have to avert my eyes.)

Reading. Disappointed in the Mapp and Lucia book I bought. Too brittle for me these days. I think I must be due a book buying session as have a need for something new. Currently rereading the charming Cider with Rosie by Laurie Lee, and an old Mary Wesley with a slightly tiresome heroine, The Vacillations of Poppy Carew.

The ornamental apples above are pretty if somewhat autumnal.

June morning and reading

Much enjoyed Mr Toppit, by Charles Elton. Well, maybe enjoyed wasn't the right word - it's a dark book with black humour, original and interesting. Do read it. Here's a Guardian review. Currently am deep in another Kate Atkinson I bought when helping on the book stall at the village fete. Inevitably I came home with about ten books.

Too busy with Wimbledon and other important matters to blog for long today. Might even branch out and buy a new tv. The one we have is at least 12 years old and was donated to us by the last of our tenants. Washing machine 20 years old too - this is an old-machines home.
Trouble is, every time I look on line or go out to buy something new am so confused by all the choices that I buy nothing.

Don't plant that yellow stuff (garden loosestrife) above unless your desperate to fill a space. It is a massive invader, but at least the rabbits don't eat it.

Tropical Connections, garden, reading

Tropical Connections is now available (USA September). Click the top-right link 'about Susie Vereker's books' if you would like more details.

This yellow shrub rose has been magnificent this year. I haven't done it justice in this photo.

Last of the spring flowers.

Reading: finally finished The Return by Victoria Hislop. A worthy book, well researched. After the success of The Island (thanks to R&J's list) she has again chosen the formula of modern woman investigates historical events. Long, long-winded even, and not a beach read, this book is about the horrors of the Spanish Civil War as seen through the eyes of one family. The war stories seemed all too real, but I couldn't quite believe the various unlikely plot twists and felt distanced from both the family and the modern heroine with her sketched-in disintegrating marriage. Nevertheless this an admirable book in that it should encourage us to read more about what has passed in modern European history. I think I'll go for non-fiction next time. Here's a brief outline via Eleanor Roosevelt.

To cheer myself up, I then read some scenes from Laurence Durrell's diplomatic comedies and laughed out loud (Esprit de Corps)

Earlier I read a Barbara Pym and enjoyed her subtleties. (Quartet in Autumn. All her characters were oldish and odd.)

Cooking. Nan's rhubarb & fruit crunch was delicious. See Letters from a Hill Farm, 15 May. I used a small teacup to measure (a whole cup of sugar seemed a bit wicked), but I must buy some American measuring cups. Perhaps an excuse to peruse the thrilling Lakeland catalogue! When first married I bought an American measuring jug abroad, and consequently half the recipes I tried didn't work properly because I didn't realise a US pint was different from a UK one.

RNA party, buns, books, cooking, and lawn shock

Up to London on Thursday for the RNA Summer party, all good fun as usual. Liz Fenwick and Janet Gover have blogged some good pictures - I was going to post a not too scary one of self from another member's site but it has gone amok this morning - the site not me, I mean. (top photo by Chloe Vereker, taken from the London Eye)

Currently have a convalescing house guest who was presented with this huge basket of buns from a smart bakery in Primrose Hill. Delicious or what, but v. bad for what's left of my waistline.

Recent reading. Much enjoyed Zoe Heller's The Believers. She's an original writer - this time her subject is a leftist US family, and a pretty dysfunctional family they are.

I also raced through one of the Shopaholic books which I found in a charity shop. Made me laugh aloud, even though I'm a reluctant shopper these days. The best kind of chick lit.

Cooking. Delicious lunch in John Lewis the other day - tagliatelli with rosemary oil, butternut squash, and fetta. Using fresh pasta plus some cooked chicken, I reproduced this dish at home and it went down a storm. My local Tesco's didn't run to rosemary oil so I just chopped up some fresh rosemary.

Last night I roasted a pork loin on a bed of roasted veg - red onions, butternut squash again and courgettes. Plus, towards the end of the cooking time, I quartered a couple of apples and stuck them into the roasting dish. All turned out pretty well. Glad I still have the odd domesticated moment.

Garden. Shock horror, the best back lawn has been attacked by animals (foxes?) who've dug about thirty small shallow holes. Not a pretty sight. Any ideas? The holes are too big to have been made by birds and don't look like rabbit scuffs - as for squirrels surely they only bury nuts in autumn.

Found the party pic(credit Nina Harrington). L to r, Liz Fenwick, self, Fiona Harper.

May Garden and Pantsman

Lovely wisteria again.

I like the dark red geranium I planted this time last year to fill this gap. If you look hard you can also see the sweet cecily, posh cow parsley, but fear it does look very similar in this rather wild garden to its cousins in my hedges. I've seen a clump of the sweet cecily in a friend's formal garden where it appears intended rather than accidental like here.

Aquilegia has come round again.

Above new beech leaves. Below, the tree peony.

Ms Mac has posted a great YouTube version of The Apprentice with Play People (Pantsman)

Do watch it, but it's probably only funny if you have seen the original on British TV, I admit.

Garden tree and Tropical Connections

Here is my old tree that may or may not be Exochorda serratifolia (exochorda is neighbour's suggestion). In my garden book, most of the other exochordas look like Spirea Bridal Wreath and the only tree-variety I can find on the net is serratifolia. It does have a tan-coloured bark - I mean, the part that's not covered in lichen is light brown and smooth. What do you think? The hardly-serrated leaves look rather small for a prunus and it has no fruit. The flowers are prunus style, though.

Just checked Amazon, the way you do, and see that Tropical Connections is for sale already though not due to be published until 1 June. So that's exciting. It's cheaper at the Book Depository, by the way. Click on the right if you fancy knowing more.